Russian Troops Loot Chechnya, Witnesses Say

GROZNY, Russia — Federal forces in the separatist republic of Chechnya have engaged in widespread, systematic looting of occupied territory, hauling household goods by the truckload to other parts of Russia, sometimes killing witnesses to their crimes, Chechen civilians and human rights activists say.

As Russian troops have moved into captured cities and towns, convoys of military trucks stuffed with appliances, rugs and kitchenware that once furnished Chechen homes have become a familiar sight on the roads leading out of the devastated province, witnesses say.

At a military airport near Grozny, the ruined Chechen capital, helicopters and trucks deliver stolen household goods that are then transferred to military transport planes, said Satsita Timrayeva, 31, a worker at the airfield.

"I have witnessed many times how soldiers brought truckloads of looted things to the airport to be further shipped to Mozdok, Khasavyurt or other destinations in Russia," she said. "I am sure this is all looted. Has anyone ever seen a commando company, for instance, traveling with bathroom mirrors, freezers or carpets? They take everything they can carry."

Based on the accounts of Chechen refugees who have fled to the neighboring republic of Ingushetia, human rights activists charge that Russian soldiers engaged in looting have killed dozens of civilians who sought to stop the soldiers or happened to witness their crimes.

New York-based Human Rights Watch has documented 123 cases in which soldiers killed civilians, and almost all of them occurred while the killers were looting Chechen homes, the group says.

"Looting is the most systematic abuse occurring in Chechnya," said Malcolm Hawkes, a Human Rights Watch researcher reached in Ingushetia. "It's highly organized; it's highly efficient. It is occurring with the full knowledge of the military authorities. Military vehicles are used to carry off the goods."

Russian officials have dismissed most charges of atrocities in Chechnya as rebel propaganda. In Moscow, the chief military prosecutor, Yuri G. Dyomin, said Friday that it would be "impossible" for looting to take place on such a mass scale because it would require the connivance of entire military units, their officers and guards at the numerous checkpoints in the occupied territory.

"In a war zone, it's completely unthinkable," the military prosecutor said. "To start with, who needs all that junk?"

Acting President Vladimir Putin, whose popularity has soared because of the war, has refused to allow any independent international investigation of charges of looting, executions, rape and other brutality in Chechnya. Nor has Putin, who is expected to win election today, risked offending the military by speaking out against atrocities or urging his troops to respect the rights of civilians.

Despite official denials of looting, Chechen civilians provide vivid accounts of how soldiers and police troops have stripped homes bare, carted away the goods in military vehicles and -- out of spite or to destroy evidence -- set houses on fire.

In Aldy, Kometa Imayeva described how she watched in February as soldiers looted the house of her neighbors, the Rakhmayevs. Another neighbor, Akhmed Atbiyev, 80, approached the soldiers and asked them to take only what they needed in their daily lives.

Without saying a word, one of the soldiers turned and shot Atbiyev, she said. When his 76-year-old sister, Sabila, 76, ran up to the body and began wailing, the same soldier shot her too, Imayeva said.

"After this, the group continued loading the booty onto the truck," she said. "The fact that they had just killed two peaceful elderly people did not stop the marauders."

On highways, the military often makes no effort to hide its activities. One convoy of five large trucks stuffed with household goods was headed toward the border with Ingushetia in late February. It was escorted by Interior Ministry troops apparently leaving Chechnya after their tour of duty in the war zone. In the last truck, men in uniform could be seen taking women's and children's clothes out of large canvas bags and holding them up, apparently selecting the items they wanted.

Human Rights Watch researcher Peter Bouckaert said inaction by military officials has given soldiers the sense that looting homes and abusing the local population is acceptable conduct.

"The military command has done little to stop looting or to punish soldiers who are caught looting," he said.